Torrential rain brought by a stationary front closed down several sections of road and caused the collapse of makeshift bridges in mountainous areas of southern Taiwan yesterday.
However, no major damage was reported as of press time last night.
The Central Weather Bureau (CWB) issued an alert at 8:45am yesterday, cautioning residents in central, southern and southeastern Taiwan to be vigilant. It also warned of the chance of sporadic heavy rain in northern and northeastern Taiwan.
PHOTO: CNA
The National Freeway Bureau said that as of noon yesterday, several sections of road and makeshift bridges along the Southern Cross-Island Highway, New Central Cross-Island Highway, Alishan Highway and mountainous areas in southern Taiwan were closed because of either flash floods or small landslides.
One of those was the Yila makeshift bridge in Pingtung County’s Wutai Township (霧台). After it was finally restored only last week, the bridge collapsed again yesterday, following heavy rain on Friday — isolating Wutai.
The CWB forecast that rainfall brought by the front would stay until tomorrow.
With the start of the rainy season, the safety of bridges nationwide is under close scrutiny.
A recent nationwide evaluation conducted by the Institute of Transportation (IOT) showed that several counties have failed to properly inspect the bridges under their jurisdiction.
The IOT is a transportation research institute under the Ministry of Transportation and Communications.
James Tseng (曾志煌), director of the IOT’s engineering division, said the institute conducts annual evaluations on the maintenance and management of bridges nationwide.
“In the evaluation, we consider several factors, including the efforts spent on inspections and maintenance of the bridges, which account for 50 percent of the grade, as well as the scores granted by civil engineering experts not affiliated with the IOT,” he said.
Yunlin, Taitung, Chiayi and Changhwa counties all scored below 60 out of 100 points, with Yunlin faring the worst.
Statistics from the IOT show that as of last year the Yunlin County Government had inspected less than 2 percent of the 1,151 bridges it manages, resulting in an overall score of 29.92 points in the evaluation.
“About 98 percent of Yunlin’s inspection records have not been updated since 2007 ... We are not sure of the safety of the county’s bridges because of the lack of updated records,” Tseng said.
Nvidia Corp yesterday unveiled its new high-speed interconnect technology, NVLink Fusion, with Taiwanese application-specific IC (ASIC) designers Alchip Technologies Ltd (世芯) and MediaTek Inc (聯發科) among the first to adopt the technology to help build semi-custom artificial intelligence (AI) infrastructure for hyperscalers. Nvidia has opened its technology to outside users, as hyperscalers and cloud service providers are building their own cost-effective AI chips, or accelerators, used in AI servers by leveraging ASIC firms’ designing capabilities to reduce their dependence on Nvidia. Previously, NVLink technology was only available for Nvidia’s own AI platform. “NVLink Fusion opens Nvidia’s AI platform and rich ecosystem for
WARNING: From Jan. 1 last year to the end of last month, 89 Taiwanese have gone missing or been detained in China, the MAC said, urging people to carefully consider travel to China Lax enforcement had made virtually moot regulations banning civil servants from making unauthorized visits to China, the Control Yuan said yesterday. Several agencies allowed personnel to travel to China after they submitted explanations for the trip written using artificial intelligence or provided no reason at all, the Control Yuan said in a statement, following an investigation headed by Control Yuan member Lin Wen-cheng (林文程). The probe identified 318 civil servants who traveled to China without permission in the past 10 years, but the true number could be close to 1,000, the Control Yuan said. The public employees investigated were not engaged in national
ALL TOGETHER: Only by including Taiwan can the WHA fully exemplify its commitment to ‘One World for Health,’ the representative offices of eight nations in Taiwan said The representative offices in Taiwan of eight nations yesterday issued a joint statement reiterating their support for Taiwan’s meaningful engagement with the WHO and for Taipei’s participation as an observer at the World Health Assembly (WHA). The joint statement came as Taiwan has not received an invitation to this year’s WHA, which started yesterday and runs until Tuesday next week. This year’s meeting of the decisionmaking body of the WHO in Geneva, Switzerland, would be the ninth consecutive year Taiwan has been excluded. The eight offices, which reaffirmed their support for Taiwan, are the British Office Taipei, the Australian Office Taipei, the
CAUSE AND EFFECT: China’s policies prompted the US to increase its presence in the Indo-Pacific, and Beijing should consider if this outcome is in its best interests, Lai said China has been escalating its military and political pressure on Taiwan for many years, but should reflect on this strategy and think about what is really in its best interest, President William Lai (賴清德) said. Lai made the remark in a YouTube interview with Mindi World News that was broadcast on Saturday, ahead of the first anniversary of his presidential inauguration tomorrow. The US has clearly stated that China is its biggest challenge and threat, with US President Donald Trump and US Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth repeatedly saying that the US should increase its forces in the Indo-Pacific region
RSS